A Moments Misconception

Equinox River Moon

Sharing the Melody

Storytime

River Walk

Adrift in Private Thoughts

Oil on Canvas 30 x 40

A Shadow of Elegance

36 x 48 Oil on Canvas

Cloud Shadows

Oil on Canvas 48 x 48

Revelation

40 x 30 Oil on Canvas

Patience in Waiting

30 x 40 Oil on Canvas

Celestial Kiss of Spring

40 x 30 Oil on Canvas with gold leaf. Actress Hope Hampton.
Hope was an American silent motion picture actress and producer, who was noted for her seemingly effortless incarnation of siren and flapper types in silent-picture roles during the 1920s.
She became known more for her stunning looks than her acting ability. Critics dubbed her Hopeless Hampton. Her seemingly lack of talent led some to believe she inspired Orson Welles’ famous character of Citizen Kane.
Hope turned to opera singing and purportedly sang with the Metropolitan Opera. This may instead have been confused with Hopes desire for attending the opening nights at the opera. She worked to sustain her reputation as this kind of performer: an indefatigable first-nighter with a frankly unabashed eye for publicity.
She was enormously famous for these first-nighters. The opera company would actually hold the curtain until she arrived, because wherever she went the publicity media would follow, especially in the 60's. Miss Hampton, seemed to love everything to do with her deliberately visible life. Quoted to have said ''I'm a supporter of everything. Especially myself.''
And just as enormously famous was her fondness for glamour. Reportedly owning 5000 blue gowns.
Blue, to match her eyes.
Decades later, society columnists took to calling her ''The Duchess of Park Avenue'' because of her opulent town house on Park Avenue and her just as opulent ‘Kardashian’ lifestyle. Way before social media as we know it today. Hope’s style springs eternal.

Symposium

40 x 30 Oil on Canvas with gold leaf.
Mia Slavenska, a child prodigy in her native Croatia, was considered Europe’s next Pavlova. She was born Mia Čorak in Croatia in 1916. She was a child star at six; at age 18, she became the first Croat Prima Ballerina at the Zagreb National Theater.
As the beginning of World War II closed in, Mia wrote a public letter criticizing the National Theater’s ballet as old fashioned and urged them to be more innovative and modern. The letter was considered politically incorrect and she was banned from the stage with fatal consequences for her career. As a result, she was forced to emigrate from Yugoslavia in order to continue dancing. After starring in Jean Benoit-Levy’s prize-winning 1937 film La Mort du Cygne about backstage life at the Paris Opera, released in America as Ballerina, Slavenska became a prima ballerina with the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo in New York.
As a glittering star of the Ballet Russe, Slavenska was known for her explicit beauty and phenomenal technique. Not content to be a muse, or dance roles she didn’t care for, Slavenska formed the Slavenska Franklin Ballet with Frederic Franklin, a colleague from the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo. In the 1950’s, the two artists, and the company they formed, ambitiously toured small towns across the United States in a modest bus. They performed in places that were too small for Ballet Theatre and the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo to go. They educated Americans about the classical dance form, creating new ballet audiences town by town. One of Mia’s greatest roles is that of Blanche in “A Streetcar Named Desire,” a modern ballet combining blues, modern, and ballet idioms.
When Slavenska retired from the stage in the early 1960s, she became a respected teacher in Los Angeles, where she was a founding faculty member of the dance department at California Institute of the Arts and a member of the dance faculty at UCLA. Slavenska was a teacher to numerous distinguished dancers including Maria Tallchief, Yoko Ichino, Mitzi Gaynor, Marion Scott, Pearl Lang, Louis Ellyn, Salvatore Guida, Donald Byrd and Meredith Monk.
The 2014 Emmy Award-winning film Mia, A Dancers Journey depicts Mia Slavenska as one of the most celebrated ballerinas of her time. It tells a story about historical memory, national identity, and the power of art. In her era, the 1930s through the 1950s, everyone in America who loved dance knew her name. Yet, despite a career that lasted decades, when Slavenska died in 2002 she believed that she had been completely forgotten. The film, created by her daughter, Maria Ramas, and by Kate Johnson, retraces Slavenska's life journey, unearthing the fascinating story of a maverick ballerina and a lost time of dance.
When Croatia won its independence in the mid-1990s, the nation began reclaiming its lost artists. Mia was accepted as a celebrated artist once again in Croatia as her ashes were interred at Mirogoi Cemetery in Croatia’s capital of Zagreb. In 2016 Croatia issued a national stamp to commemorate Slavenska’s 100th birthday.
Mia Slavenska hasn't been forgotten after all.
Contributions in part by Maria Ramas.